


Kraken the Case

by ssalison



Category: Temeraire - Naomi Novik
Genre: Gen, Laurence is Confused and Well-Meaning, My First AO3 Post, My First Fanfic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-07
Updated: 2020-04-19
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:34:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22593352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ssalison/pseuds/ssalison
Summary: Captain William Laurence of the HMS Reliant had survived gales and typhoons of the worst sort, had captured French ships in the multitudes, but found himself utterly powerless before the shining, hopeful eyes of Emily Roland, the courier from the Draconian Aerial Corps that had waylaid him in the marketplace.She had scrambled through the crowd before tugging on his sleeve urgently, chattering excitedly about the disappearance of livestock, the mysterious churning of giant waves in the distance, how ships have begun disappearing off of the coast of Portugal.As an after-thought, she remembers to salute and introduce herself.
Relationships: William Laurence & Temeraire
Comments: 9
Kudos: 40





	1. In Which the Captain Unknowingly Pursues Some Unlikely Career Choices

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! So I dicked around during English and this is what happened. I've never written fanfic before so any feedback would be appreciated! 
> 
> If you want to alternately yell w me abt this fandom or send recs my twitter is @alisonshiding 
> 
> :)))

Captain William Laurence of the HMS Reliant had survived gales and typhoons of the worst sort, had captured French ships in the multitudes, but found himself utterly powerless before the shining, hopeful eyes of Emily Roland, the courier from the Draconian Aerial Corps that had waylaid him in the marketplace.

She had scrambled through the crowd before tugging on his sleeve urgently, chattering excitedly about the disappearance of livestock, the mysterious churning of giant waves in the distance, how ships have begun disappearing off of the coast of Portugal. As an after-thought, she remembers to salute and introduce herself.

“I have never heard of such a case before, Emily, and absolutely no clue of how I could be of use. It really seems more in your field of purview,” says Laurence apologetically. The sea breeze shifts his fair hair into his eyes, and absentmindedly, he tucks the offending strands back behind his ear. Emily’s grip on the edge of Laurence’s navy-blue coat does not slacken in the least, however.

“I am sure you will be sir, only pray give us a chance. Your ship will not be leaving for many months yet, and what are you to do in the meantime?” she presses. Privately, Laurence thinks of the piles of correspondence he has neglected over the past weeks. He had sailed into the port of Madeira only a week prior, with little fanfare. The HMS Reliant was only meant to be delivering some precious cargo to Port X, when they had run into some trouble with the mast. Materials for it needed to be acquired, and that in and of itself needed to take at least a month. Now he is stuck, waiting, with little to occupy his time. Although the war against Napoleon was trudging on (as was the nature of wars), here in the idyllic town, little of the ongoing violence could be felt. So Emily’s roundabout logic was making some sense to Laurence, who was already tired of the drinking and mischief-making his men were likely to get up to.

In fact, gazing bemusedly down at the obstinate courier, Laurence could clearly see that she would doggedly pursue him back to even his little room above the harborside inn if need be.

Beyond Laurenc'es own hatred for malingering, the DAC had always delighted in their own secret draconian methods and functioned as an almost separate branch of the military. Their jobs were to handle situations beyond the regular and easily explained, part detective agency, part federal task force, all slightly mad (if rumors of their exploits were to be believed). But they were still a part of His Majesty’s government, and refusing this charge would be to reject an order, no matter how contrived and strange it seemed.

“Well, if it must be so,” he says, relenting. “Please show me the way to your covert, as I am still unfamiliar with town.” If Emily couldn’t be dissuaded by himself, might as well go along with her until some authority of the Corps could.


	2. In Which the Captain Discovers the True Scope of the Corps’ Lunacy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Beg pardon?” asks Laurence, dismayed and desperately hoping he had heard wrong. Berkley: aggressively ginger. Roland: slyly smiling. Neither looked like the joking sort.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> should i continue this? 
> 
> hmmmmm

After dragging Laurence across half the city, Roland deposited him ceremoniously in front of a nondescript oak door in the highest tower of the stone covert, where he had been ushered in by another officer before being introduced to Captain Berkley of Maximus the Regal Copper (presumably his dragon and its breed?), a man with bushy ginger hair and even bushier eyebrows. 

“Captain William Laurence of the  _ HMS Reliant _ , at your service,” says Laurence politely, bowing. 

“Took Emily long enough. I’ve been waiting for you since half past four, and now look at the time,” the captain says, slightly miffed. Laurence stiffens imperceptibly. The tone verged on outright belligerent, and also unimaginable in any officer of Laurence’s in the navy. Why, the biggest slip of manners Laurence had ever witnessed was when he had seen a first lieutenant taking off his neckcloth to clean off a smudge of dirt (his bare neck! in public!).

“I apologize sir, I imagine Roland had not been able to find me in such a crowded marketplace.” Laurence replies, perfectly, achingly civil. His tone flies in a perfect arc above Captain Berkley’s head. In fact, Laurence is sure his tone is performing taunting loops above Berkley’s head just to spite Laurence, who cannot fly away from this conversation.

“Oh, he called  _ you _ sir,” laughs the female officer who had first ushered Laurence inside the office. She’s well-muscled and clearly used to a little violence, judging by the thin white scars wending their way up her cheek.

“Oh, this is Captain Jane Roland of Lily the Longwing,” says Berkley airily, waving vaguely in her vicinity. “I expect you’ll see a lot of her, as she’s been the one assigned to the whole kraken debacle.”

“Beg pardon?” asks Laurence, dismayed and desperately hoping he had heard wrong. Berkley: aggressively ginger. Roland: slyly smiling. Neither looked like the joking sort. 

“The locals are all busy posturing dramatically and itching the solve the ‘mystery,’ as if the answer isn’t perfectly obvious to anyone with half a brain,” sniffs Roland disapprovingly, crossing her arms. “I mean,  _ really _ , kraken leave the most distinctive marks on their prey of any heavy-weight I know, and the clearest trail of destruction.” 

“I had thought they were native to Norway,” says Laurence faintly. He sits down heavily in the nearest chair, a cushioned monstrosity with mysterious singe marks.

“They are,” Berkley said grimly. “No one’s got any blasted idea what he’s doing in this part of the world, so far from his feeding grounds. And it’s not like anyone speaks Norwegian  _ here _ .” 

Er. 

“Well,  __ I do speak some words, if that would be of any help,” says Laurence.

Berkley’s eyes become very bright and he leans forward, before being almost immediately cut off by Roland. 

“Well, why didn’t you say so earlier?” she asks, the amused undercurrent still present in her voice.

“I apologize for the trouble,” Berkley says, not sounding sorry in the least. “But we’re in a bit of a bind at the moment, captain, and all our usual avenues of help are tied up in old Boney’s war. We need you, and we need a large ship, and your  _ Reliant _ , as the only 45-gun frigate we’ll possibly hope to see this week, is probably our best hope for getting out of this damned mess.”

Roland snorts.

Laurence flounders (but still manages to think some mildly disapproving thoughts about the language allowed in the Corps’ superior officers). 

There was no precedent he could recall regarding what his exact duties were towards the Corps, as Laurence is a navy man down to his very bones and had what amounted to no experience with the lot of them. And if Laurence is a navy man down to his very bones, he considers himself duty-bound to the English crown in his very fibers (others have phrased it as being “honor-obsessed” and “a total square”). 

So he gives way again, and is quickly re-stationed in an empty apartment in a different tower of the covert for ease of access (access for who is never quite explained to Laurence). His partially voiced dissuasions that no, really, his room above the inn is perfectly serviceable are completely trampled over in the face of Berkley and Roland’s combined enthusiasm. 


	3. In Which the Captain Finally Speaks Some Norwegian

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Oh, don’t look at me like that,” says the kraken, sounding as miffed as a hundred-ton creature possibly can. “My tentacles aren’t very sensitive to touch.”
> 
> might fuck around and write some more if i'm bored, let me know!

“Hello?” Laurence yells, shouting into the distance. “This feels very silly,” he says as an aside. He’s standing on the dragondeck of the Allegiance. They’d set off just as the sun was beginning to set, and the sun’s golden disc paints the waters around them in shining flames. 

Roland leans over the side of the Allegiance perfunctorily before draping herself back over the dragon deck, the metal-lined extended boards necessary to transport even a smallwing across the seas. 

“Do you even care—” Laurence mutters, before a sharp jerk in the ship sends him tumbling back first into the deck railing. Out of the corner of his eye he sees the crew members and Roland thrown in a similar fashion.

“What—” he manages to get out before he’s sent tumbling again, this time to the other end of the ship. 

“Oh, I do apologize. These dragon decks are pretty flimsy, aren’t they?” says a rumbling voice from behind him. 

Laurence turns around. Slowly. 

“Oh, don’t look at me like that,” says the kraken, sounding as miffed as a hundred-ton creature can. “My tentacles aren’t very sensitive to touch.” 

“My fault entirely,” says Laurence faintly.


	4. In Which the Captain Makes a New Friend

“I mean, it really wasn’t,” the kraken says dubiously. “You know, your fault? Kind of a stupid thing to say to someone.”

This jerks Laurence out of his stupefied daze. “Well, I still want to apologize for scaring you.” He grips the slippery-wet ship railing tightly, with both hands. He’s not scared, exactly. The kraken’s eyes are dark and its (his?) teeth exceptionally sharp, flashing bright off of the setting sun, but there is a lively expression in its eyes and gestures that Laurence finds (absurdly) familiar.

There’s silence on the ship for a long, stretched-out moment. Laurence can faintly hear the crew gathering in his peripheral vision, but he ignores it. He’s still maintaining eye contact with the kraken.

It stares down at him, before abruptly saying, “You’ll do as well as anyone else, I suppose. You may call me Temeraire.” Laurence barely has any time to react before the kraken begins shrinking, its skin folding in on itself in defiance of all logic. Instead of facing the looming, snake-tentacle cross of five seconds ago, what lies on the deck of the ship is a sleek, blue-black, four-legged reptilian creature that comes up to his shoulder.

It flicks its new tail impatiently. “Well?”

Laurence, on pure instinct alone, reaches out his right hand for a handshake. “Captain William Laurence of the HMS Reliant, at your service.” Both him and Temeraire glance down at his outstretched palm before he hurriedly retracts it. He doesn’t blush, but it’s a close thing.


End file.
